In each of these content areas, the challenge has been to deliver clarity, completeness and velocity in training for complex work processes. At the same time an accompanying challenge has been to deliver a project implementation process that manages the time investment for learners, managers and the project execution team.

Organizations in which complex processes are commonplace have found in Purcell a like-minded and trustworthy partner.

In Your Enterprise

Many enterprises find, in every corner of their business, more people mastering more and more complexity. Besides mastering complex content for their own understanding, more people communicate complex and technical concepts to colleagues and customers.

Sometimes the signals of complexity in a work process can be heard in the comments of the people who execute that process. You may hear, for example:

“It takes a long time for a new hire to learn our technology. Some of our customers are leading experts in the field, and we have to be able to keep up a conversation with them.”

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“Associates have to have at least a year on the job before they’re ready to learn this part of the process.”

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“This part of our job is more of an art than a science. It varies too much from time to time to pin it down to a repeatable process.”

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“It took me five years to really learn to do this. A lot of people never really do get it.”

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“People develop their own ways of doing things. As long as the end results are good, we don’t manage the means too tightly.”

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When you hear these comments, you are facing complex subject matter.

In Advanced Training Only?

Complexity is common both to advanced training and to foundational training.

Complexity is obvious in advanced projects, when learning content includes uncommon technologies whose functionality must be understood, analyzed, described and applied. But advanced skill sets like these aren’t the only source of complexity.

Here is an example of complexity in foundational learning: Formulating interview questions, for instance, is a foundational competency for selling, for customer service, for problem solving, for selection, for coaching, for conflict resolution and other skills. As a fundamental skill it is straightforward to describe, to perform and to learn. Combined with complex subject matter, however, the questioning sequence itself becomes complex.

On top of complexity in the subject matter, there may be many possibilities for change of direction or multiple branching for alternative responses in the interview.

Purcell delivers for both ends of the continuum – from the most advanced training to the most basic.